"there was always 'caine"

Jul 31, 2006

"there was always 'caine" · by khal

Ever since Ray-gun tried to expound upon Nixon’s “war on drugs”, the ghettos of America have been overrun with what today’s kids call “that crack”. As a matter of fact, today’s kids are bombarded with “that crack” in the form of Rap tracks that get played back to back on the radio stations many old school heads have since turned off. This “Crack Rap” has been around for a while, first gaining crazy exposure on the ironic anti-drug anthem “White Lines”, where a coked up rapper spouted the cons (pros?) of coke use. From then on, it seems that every year there was more talk about this drug that was murking the ghettos. The thing is, ever since Jay-Z made loads of money retelling his hustler days(?), it seems like everyone in the booth is moving much weight in their respective hood. This brings me to one question that never seems to get answered: how can EVERYONE be selling boatloads of crack in their hood? When did “keepin’ it real” turn into “keepin’ it white”?

In its infancy, Crack Rap came out of the boroughs of New York, where Jay-Z was “movin’ a brick a week”, Big L was “selling blow in the park”, and the infamous Juelz Santana actually had the audacity to state that he is, in fact, crack (for good or ill). Most forget (or don’t recognize) the originators of this thing: Raekwon and Ghost from the Wu-Tang Clan. Rae’s debut album was full of coke sniffing, weight movin’… that purple tape was the basis for a lot of the slobs who are eating off of Sucker Free and 106 and Park telecasts. I always ask myself though: if everyone is Pablo Escobar, where the fuck are all of these crackheads? I mean, the Billboard top 10 “Hip-Hop” lists from the last few summers have been populated by guys who felt they needed to “trap or die,” all selling the largest amount of coke (“soft or hard”), but there’s no Newsweek article proclaiming that “Crackheads are dying like hotcakes!”… which leaves only 2 options: 1) Niggas is lying, or 2) Niggas is selling some weak, stepped-on product. The thing is, who is going to look for a crack fiend to co-sign the drug tales of a bunch of wayward niggas? Not the kid, I have a family… which, without this hater-investigation, allows these shenanigans to go on. Niggas can move more O’s than a little bit in the booth: as long as it sounds hot to that beat, it’s all G.

You might be asking “how do I know if my favorite rapper is actually a Crack Rap all-star?” Well, there’s an easy way to determine this: take crack out of their raps, and if their shit can’t hold water talent-wise, they are crack rappers. While Big L didn’t build his whole career on slangin’ crack in his raps, Young Jeezy practically has nothing else to speak on but dope-filled “traps”. There was a line in the last Clipse We Got It For Cheap mixtape that went something like this: “Gotta thank God for ‘caine, I guess that’s the twist/’Cause if I never sold, my rhymes would sound like this”… and he says not a thing. That’s exactly how the majority of these crack rapper’s LPs would sound. It’s just ill that the Clipse have the balls to admit it.

The scary thing is, with the plethora of blow-laden Billboard hits, there are old school vets who feel the need to dive back into that Crack Rap. Busta Rhymes has a kinship with purple tape Rae, who collabo’d on “Goldmine”, which has Busta talking about making loot off of “cookin’ the coke up”, when he came in the game on some hopping around the high school because of the fucking PTA… Ghostface went to Mars and came back with crazy ass flows and stories about “humpin’ the bed”, but now is back to not feeling his face and breaking down the blow by the kilo. Is this what it takes to sell records? Well, based on the record sales of Fishscale and The Big Bang, so far, nah. Let this be a lesson to you old MCs trying to make rap money off of crack fables: D.A.R.E. …

Now before you guys try and e-mail me about what I have said about these “hustlin’ niggas,” I am in no way dissing the guys with talent. B.I.G. wrote a lot of these peons a manual on selling dope, and he did it with a certain amount of wit. The aforementioned Clipse and Jay-Z have been able to flip that topic so many different ways, the same tale can sound so fresh throughout an entire album. I just get tired of niggas like Jeezy, who will sell a “Snowman” t-shirt, then try to tell XXL that his shirt has Nathan to do with an undercover coke reference. Dog, your career is built on cocaine. We know that coke dealers are called “snowmen” on the low. You aren’t that fucking smart, chief. And for the lot of you crack rappers who were not mentioned… you didn’t go under the radar. You will be called out in the future, you corner-huggin’ slugs. One.
————————————-

Catch more of khal at his blog Rock the dub

Comments for ""there was always 'caine""

Thats some real shit. Now if only some rappers with an ounce of sense could just admit to their own treason.

I always felt like this, If these cats was selling so much blow in the streets why are they signing deals to work for somebody else at a label? If these niggaz was making so much loot why not put out records independently?

Dont get it twisted though a lot of labels got started off of dope money; Cash Money, No Limit, Death Row, Roca Fella, Rap-A-lot etc. etc. however these certain labels were all independent and had label heads that were real “Bosses” we aint talking about these coonin ass negroes that dominate the charts. You can tell that a real dope seller has a certain swagger and arrogance and unmistakable business sense that comes from years in the fast lane.

These rappers today are fake a $3 bill and are as entertaining as a crackhead stripper at your bachelor party. Some how they are getting over.

— Curt McGirt Aug 7, 10:28 PM